


A Lion's Pride

by coaldustcanary



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, F/M, Female Protagonist, POV Female Character, community: asoiaf_exchange
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-07-11
Updated: 2011-07-11
Packaged: 2017-10-21 06:41:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,727
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/222064
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/coaldustcanary/pseuds/coaldustcanary
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Myrcella is wife to Trystane Martell as a new spring begins after the end of the Long Night, and she must play her own game of thrones now to survive.</p><p>(Post-series speculation in the form of a Myrcella POV chapter. Written prior to the release of <i>A Dance With Dragons</i>.)</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Lion's Pride

**Author's Note:**

> Written for fallingtowers in the asoiaf_exchange, Summer 2011. Based off of a prompt asking about a possible future for Myrcella.

Myrcella stood at the window to her apartments, looking out into the gardens, the air heavy with the scent of ripened fruit and lush green plants. She inhaled, deeply, finding the now-familiar, rich aromas relaxing. Even through the Long Night, the Water Gardens had cycled through the growing seasons, the blood oranges growing small, with pale flesh and thick skins in the dry, dusty coolness that had overtaken Dorne during those dark days. Spring had returned, and the rich fruit with it, weighing down the branches of the trees lining the still pools below. Despite the burgeoning warmth, she shivered, drawing her light cloak close around her shoulders. The gardens were a gift – she had learned the tale years ago, eagerly hearing the stories her hosts had been all too willing to tell when she was just a wide-eyed child, not yet eleven. Prince Moran Martell had raised them for his Targaryen bride, called Daenerys. In return, her brother, the second Daeron, had wed the sister of the Dornish prince, Myriah. Thus was Dorne the only land in Westeros to come peacefully under the dragon banner of the Targaryens generations past.

Perhaps that was what her uncle had intended when she had been promised to Trystane – to bring Dorne into peaceful compact with her family’s ambitions. But she was no Daenerys, for all that the gardens were hers – her sanctuary and solace. She was not the princess of ages past, nor the Queen who ruled now from King’s Landing.

_But neither am I a child any longer. And my uncle’s plans no longer include me._

As she turned away from the window, Senna stood from where she knelt, packing the last item into Myrcella’s trunk and closing the lid.

“My lady?” Senna gestured toward the riding gown and sheer veil laid out upon the plump cushions of the divan, and then she reached for the cloak on Myrcella’s shoulders to help her disrobe and change. With a soft sigh, she handed over the soft orange wrap, the color of the blood oranges ripening on the tree, just as the door to her chamber swept open and her husband strode into the room.

Trystane was already dressed to ride, wearing elegant, soft deep orange leathers and a tunic with the sun and spear picked out in gold against a garnet sun upon his breast. A golden cloak of sheer sandsilk hung from his shoulders and a half-helm draped in similar fabric rested against his side, under his arm. His eyes were dark, his pointed brows drawn down into a brooding expression as he looked to his wife. Senna hesitated in her efforts to help Myrcella disrobe, turning to bow to the prince, whose full lips set into a firmer line.

“You ought not ride. I have called for a litter to be readied.” He eyed the riding gown laid out for her with clear displeasure.

“Then tell them to set it aside, and have Lioness saddled. I will ride,” Myrcella responded calmly. Three times they had debated the topic, and each time Trystane had given way before her certainty. She would have her way in this.

“Myrcella, be reasonable. Be _safe_. If the horse should shy…or even stumble, what would happen to the child?” As Trystane’s voice alternated between plaintiveness and a hint of anger, Senna began to retreat into the servant’s room attached to the suite, but Myrcella halted her with a gesture and waved the young woman back to begin loosening the laces of her bodice. Time was precious, and they could not afford to lose any to a repeated argument.

“Lioness will not stumble. She is as sure-footed as a goat, and I have a better seat than you, Trys. You know it, and I. As well as you know that I must be seen. I will not hide behind the curtains of a litter, not today. Your sister does not recline in a litter. Nor do your cousins. They will think me soft, and meek. Your brother will think the same, and what he thinks the Queen will know.” She let out a sigh as the last of the laces was loosened and the gentle binding relaxed, letting Senna remove the gown.

“Once, that might have served,” she murmured thoughtfully, her brow crinkling. It was not the path she had chosen, however useful it might have been for Daenerys to think her beneath contempt. It was not the woman she had become when she rarely traveled outside the walls of the Water Gardens, and to play that game would be a poor mummer’s lie. Trystane ignored her quiet words and thoughtful expression, his tight mouth bending into a scowl.

“No. You will think only of yourself. My father rode in a litter, and he was neither soft nor meek!” he snapped.

“No, my love,” Myrcella replied softly. “Your father, gods bless him, was neither of those things, but he knew the cost of the litter, and hiding from public appearances. It was better than the alternative, but it made it easier for the people to curse him when he made decisions that were not popular, but protected Dorne – like accepting me as your wife. I will _not_ hide, because I think of us, and our child. Our children to come.” She stood unabashedly in her sheer shift, her glinting green eyes meeting his stormy ones frankly while Senna gathered up the riding dress. As she predicted, Trystane knew when he was beaten, and when she was right. With a growl of frustration, he turned and stalked from the room, and the tension that had gathered in her gut began to ease. She was half-tempted to call out after him, to ease his anger – each time they fought, no matter the importance or triviality of the issue, it pained her.

 _We will be good to you,_ she whispered silently to the child growing within her. _Not full of anger and bitterness like my parents, not distant and wounded like Trystane’s. I love him, and he loves me, little one. But today, for my sake, and for the sake of all your kin – all of them – I must be strong._  
Myrcella helped Senna arrange the dress so that it settled properly over her form. Her breasts and belly were not yet noticeably affected by the child growing within, so the dress still looked perfectly elegant. Still, Senna laced it carefully so that it was supportive but not overly constricting. The woman’s deft fingers brushed lightly over Myrcella’s hair, seeing that the intricate arrangement was still in place, covering the remnants of her butchered ear, though it did nothing to hide the scar that split her cheek, twisting the corner of her mouth oddly. For that, there was the veil, which conveniently marked her as an adopted daughter of Dorne as much as the cut of her dress or her appetite for dragon peppers. Even men wore sheer sandsilk veils when they rode the sands, and hers was so fine a weave that it barely softened her features, just enough to draw the eye away from her scar.

The veil had become a useful tool, of sorts. She had found, to her amazement, that she could use its sheer shroud to appear particularly demure or as sultry as some brazen lord’s sultry paramour. It did not hide…but it blurred. It pulled at the eyes of men, and forced the eyes of others away, and if she could not wield spear or shield, at least she had this, her own sort of armor.

As Senna helped her with her riding boots, two male servants came to collect her trunk, and she nodded to them as they hefted it and started for the courtyard where the wagon waited for her belongings and Trystane’s, as well as gifts for Trys’s brother Quentyn, who would be arriving as the emissary of Queen Daenerys to Princess Arianne. In the winter years, she had not left the sanctuary of the gardens, even to Sunspear, not since she had left the city in a litter, her bandaged face on fire and her head full of confusion. It had been beyond her understanding, then – brave Ser Arys dead, and the hard, silver-haired man’s terrible expression as he had brought his blade around in a cruel arc toward her face. If the horse beneath her had not shied away from the ring of steel on steel, she would not have survived Gerold Dayne’s cut.

 _Yet I live, and the Darkstar’s night has ended_ , she reminded herself silently as she rose and strode from her chambers, her footfalls echoing through pale pink stone hallways and graceful stairways as she descended to the courtyard. Lioness, her golden sandsteed, was saddled, barded in gold and orange, with a red tassel dangling from her browband as guard against insects alighting on the mare’s delicate face. A groom held her rein, his expression deferential, but it was Trys who stood at the mare’s stirrup, his expression still a mask, his dark hair falling in his face as he awaited her. Myrcella smiled. He might not see her lips behind the veil, but he knew her eyes, the tilt of her head. He sighed as she stepped beside him, his eyes briefly closing as her gloved hand sought his.

“You still insist on this?” It was only half a question, and she did not speak an answer, only turning and placing her hand on the saddlebow. Before she could lift her foot to the stirrup, Trys bent down, gently cupping her leg, and lifted her bodily into the saddle. They were much of a height – Trys was not tall, for a man – but he was strong, easily settling her into place atop the mare’s back.

“Please be careful,” he murmured, low enough for only her ears, his hand still gently holding her leg. It was not only about the ride and its attendant risks. He was afraid, even, at some level, of his own siblings. Quentyn had been fostered away for so long, and they had seen each other so little as children, and now the elder was the Queen’s man, through and through, and Arianne was learning to be as canny as Doran had been in order to protect Dorne. Neither she nor Trys had yet been summoned to King’s Landing to bend the knee to the queen, though there had been many months of relative peace across the scarred land as a tentative spring brought a thaw. Nor had her uncle Tyrion sent any word, despite his place at the queen’s side since her return. Like Quentyn, Tyrion was one of Daenerys’ most trusted councilors, yet Quentyn had sent ravens and messengers to his kin, while her uncle remained silent. Perhaps he preferred to distance himself from the remainder of his living blood. Perhaps he did not think of her at all. Trading her title of Princess of the Seven Kingdoms for that of Princess of Dorne had likely not endeared her any more to Daenerys, either. She was still the Usurper’s daughter…perhaps.

 _Even if the rumors are true,_ she thought dispassionately as she squeezed her fingers reassuringly over Trystane’s hand, _it only means I am of different traitor’s blood._ She suddenly wished for her mother, deeply, a sense of loss so sudden it was almost dizzying. There were so many questions she wanted to ask, questions that her mother could no longer answer. She watched as Trystane stepped away to his own mount, a plain, steady gray gelding more intelligent than a horse had any right to be. He preferred the horse beyond any flashy stallion in the stables, and though a small, vain part of her wished he was mounted on some eye-catching beast befitting his rank, she loved him for his thoughtfulness, too.

Mother would never have accepted Trystane’s little oddities, the things that made him less bold and more thoughtful than either of his siblings. Father always made Mother so angry, no matter what he did…and he had never much seemed to care, and she had never seemed to forgive him. Joff always had tried to make him care, but it had not done much good. Myrcella had learned that it was best not to try while she was still very young. Her father, if he was, was a very dim figure in her mind, and she never wished that he was magically here for her. He had always been either shouting or laughing in her memories, always at a distance.

Pushing thoughts of the dead from her mind, she gently urged Lioness to a smooth, swaying walk as the left the sanctuary of the gardens, surrounded by columns of mounted guards and followed by the wagon with their luggage as well as her attendant, Senna. Once on the road to Sunspear, gentle-paced Lioness walked swiftly, her gait smooth and sure-footed, keeping pace with Trystane’s gray. Myrcella longed to touch her heel to the sandsteed’s sleek golden sides and tear across the sands or gallop along the shore, but Trystane would be furious and her poor guards would risk apoplexy. They moved with a steady pace along the coastal road, the breeze tugging at loose wisps of her intricately-bound hair and fluttering her headwrap and pressing the sheer veil against the contours of her face.

If they were lucky, the long silence from King’s Landing, followed by the invitation to Sunspear for Quentyn’s arrival, meant that the queen intended mercy. She could have come herself, upon her monstrous black dragon, and condemned her. She might have sent her queer foreign soldiers, the cut men or the horse lords, and dragged her to King’s Landing to be imprisoned in the Red Keep. But she had not, and a new planting had begun to ripen before the polite invitation arrived on raven’s wings. This could be a quiet visit, and Quentyn would make clear the queen’s expectations, and she and Trystane would reaffirm their loyalty. It had been five years since Arianne had tried to crown her as Queen of the Seven Kingdoms, and it would never happen again. There were no loyalists, Baratheon or Lannister, waiting for her to overthrow the dragon queen, and Myrcella hoped fervently that there never would be. She tried very hard to put out of her mind Quentyn’s formal role on the queen’s council, besides representing Dorne’s interests – Master of Laws. He had studied to rule Dorne, once. Now he helped Daenerys rule all of the Seven Kingdoms.

“I’m not even certain I’ll recognize him.” Trystane’s voice was low and unhappy, and sounded more like the boy he had once been than the man he was now. The gray’s ears flicked backward and his head tossed impatiently as Trystane tightened his grip on the rein.

“He is your brother, he…”

“He is a stranger,” Trystane replied broodingly. Myrcella turned her gaze from the sea to her husband.

“I know how you must feel, Trys. When he was fostered, you were even younger than Tommen was when I was sent away here, and there are more years between you.” She forced herself to ignore the wounds of her own loss. She had never missed Joff’s cruelty, but Tommen she mourned. “But you know how your father wrote to him, how he went to the queen on your father’s word. He cannot be unworthy of that.”

“I suppose we will find out.” Sunspear was dark compared to the Water Gardens, all brown – dun and russet and mud - and though she had grown, the city loomed larger before her than it had in memory. The sun and spear banner hung from many walls, but so did the red and black blazon of the queen, the sinuous three-headed dragon undulating in the wind off the ocean. As their party approached the gates of the city, many of the smallfolk, come to see the city welcome its Prince home and see the splendor of the preparations, turned to gaze upon the elegant party.

“The Young Prince!” one cried, surprise in the high, clear voice

“Trystane!” Shouts and murmurs from the passerby and traders overlapped into a rush of noise. Trys raised his  
hand to greet the shouts, and some ragged cheers went up from the milling crowds.

“No veil can hide you!” Her shoulders tensed, muscles knotting still with fear at the cry from one of the crowd. Her eyes darted, looking, but she couldn’t see from where it came.

“The False King’s daughter!” another voice shouted. “The Stag’s get!” The cheers faded, and angry murmuring mixed with the talk like the low buzz of an insect. The memories of the Dornish were long. They had not forgotten Elia and her children. They had not forgotten the Viper.

“No fear of _that_!” another voice mocked. She saw this one. An older man, with the hard, fair look of the mountain Dornishmen.

“Lionspawn,” another growled, and the crowd seemed to contract and push against the columns of men guarding her and Trystane on either side, the soldiers forced to slam their heavy spears against their shields in warning. But some were not dissuaded. A half-ripe orange sailed through the air, bouncing off of the shield of the guard to her right. A lime splattered on the pavement beneath Lioness’s hooves. The steady mare kept an even, brisk walking pace, and Myrcella kept her back straight and her chin high. _I will not fear. It is only fruit. Only fruit._ And then it was not. She only glimpsed it from the corner of her eye, a hand raised, and a fist with something darker and more substantial than any orange. She tightened her knees around her mount and ducked down behind the mare’s neck, just as the broken brick sailed through the air where she had been, clattering off of the mail of the armsman at her side, knocking him off balance enough for his mount to stagger. Beneath Lioness’s neck, she glimpsed smallfolk, pressed by the horse, screaming and thrashing, and the edges of the crowd thinned as some ducked down alleyways and between carts and market stalls. Other faces, however, were set and angry.

“ENOUGH!” Trystane’s voice rose above the rabble as he kneed his horse close to her. He had drawn his sword, and he held it aloft, ready for the next attempt, his teeth bared in fury.

“Does Dorne keep the queen’s peace? Does Dorne honor the guest-right of Sunspear and House Martell? Or do Dorne’s sons and daughters brawl in the streets like mongrel dogs?” Trystane’s voice was stern and full of rebuke. Myrcella held her breath, ready to heel her mount ahead, and fast, among a knot of her guards. The crowd was so close. Were the words a spark to tinder or a bucket of cold water? The moment wavered for the space of a breath before the milling mass of smallfolk and traders began to dissipate. Shame showed on some faces, frustration on others, and even apathy on some others, Myrcella noted as she straightened, gathering up Lioness’s reins. Plenty of them had been caught up in the moment, but without any real rancor for her. But some cared. Some still carried deep grudges indeed.

“Symon, we will make haste. Go,” Trystane said curtly to the captain of the guards who had accompanied them, sheathing his sword. The guardsmen bunched up more closely around her and Trys as they continued toward an equally uncertain reception at the Tower of the Sun. Trys turned to look at her, and instead of anger, she saw hurt there. Though she has remained ensconced within the Water Gardens, Trystane had tended to duties in Sunspear and abroad in the intervening years. He expected more from his people, but had not been willing to believe how long the anger against her would abide.

“It will not always be like this. We can return to the gardens soon, and all will be well. Children will play in the pools again. Our children will play in them, just as you did,” she said softly. “And time will soften even this.” _Maybe it will be long after I am withered and gray, but the day will come._

“If I cannot protect you here, I do not know that I can protect you anywhere.” It was something that had weighed on his shoulders since they were children together. He was competent with sword and shield, as befitting his rank, but he had never squired for a soldier the way his brother had, and his father had kept him at his side in the Water Gardens for those years rather than send him north into the true, bitter cold to fight when the Wall had fallen. He had only been fourteen, after all, and like as not he would have died, as so many did. But it ate at him nonetheless, not having the same opportunities to prove his valor and his ability.

“It will be the queen’s will that protects me, if anything does, Trys. It will be well. You will see.” Though his expression was all doubt and frustration to her eye, he fell silent as they approached the keep and their horses’ hooves clattered across the brick and into the courtyard. The letter from Quentyn had indicated that this was to be a private occasion, not a spectacle, but it seemed to Myrcella that the courtyard was lined with people. Arianne’s was a familiar face, her bearing regal and steady, her dress ivory and gold. She had not chosen to marry during the years of the Long Night, though Myrcella had heard Senna and her other handmaidens gossiping amongst themselves that certainly she would wed some ally of the dragon queen to once again strengthen Dorne’s ties to the Iron Throne. But perhaps Quentyn would be enough in that regard – rumor also said that Arron Qorgyle had paid his court to the princess, and the scorpion knight was neither uncomely nor unworthy.

The man standing near Arianne, in orange and gold garb of an unfamiliar cut but with the familiar sun and spear outlined on his breast, must be Quentyn. She would have known him even without the Martell colors, she realized – this must have been what her goodfather looked like before the disease had tortured his flesh and aged him beyond his years. His short-cut brown hair was lightly frosted with gray, despite his relative youth, and his eyes were the color of the sands, just as Doran’s had been. But it was less those details than the set of his expression, and the tilt of his mouth that suggested the look of his father – the thoughtfulness there, a trait he shared with Trys. Those eyes sought hers as the guards parted before her and Trystane. She met his gaze for a moment as a slender man in livery came forward to hold Lioness’s bridle while she dismounted, and then lost the look of him as she gracefully stepped from the saddle. Her legs shook a little as her boots touched the cobblestones, and she took a deep breath to steady herself as Trystane joined her, his hand slipping beneath her arm as they walked up the steps toward his siblings.

Her husband stared as his brother, his dark eyes hungry for the sight of him, but the slightest squeeze from her hand reminded him of his duties. They went first to Arianne, and she curtseyed while Trystane bowed. This was not high court, but the household was in attendance, arranged beyond the Martell siblings, as well as several guardsmen in Targaryen colors who must have traveled with Quentyn. The formalities would be observed for their benefit.

“Trystane, Myrcella, welcome.” Arianne’s smile curved her full lips sweetly, and a part of Myrcella longed to rush and embrace the other woman. There was a time when she had been sure Arianne was the sister she had always dreamed of, and despite all that had happened, she loved her as a sister still.

“I’m honored to return to Sunspear during this time of joy for your family, Princess Arianne,” she said softly.

“Your family too, sister,” said Quentyn, a mercurial smile playing about his lips as he stepped forward and gripped Trystane’s hand, pulling the younger man into an embrace. “You’re a man grown now. The youngest, and the only one of us wed,” he laughed softly. It was a jest, but one flavored with uneasiness. Quentyn had sought the queen’s hand, but she had demurred, and had not yet taken a husband, after the refusal of the Lord Commander of the Night’s Watch. It was strange, Myrcella mused in that moment. She’d met the man who had turned out to be the trueborn Targaryen heir as a child, masquerading as the bastard of the traitor Lord Stark. Now the Watch were guardians against the dark across the north – there was no longer a Wall for them to walk – and the man who still called himself by the bastard name Snow, despite the queen’s assertion that he was Rhaegar’s son, remained as their leader, unwed. But with peace, the talk would grow to a fever pitch. A realm without an heir, especially one still torn to pieces from the Long Night, was without a future.  
“I’m lucky that way,” Trystane said quietly, still drinking in the sight of his brother. “Quentyn. I don’t know what…I’m glad you’ve come back. You look so much like Father,” he blurted, bemused.

“Down to the gray in my hair, I know, but for different reasons, you may trust. Will you introduce me properly to your lady, Trys?” he said sweetly, his eyes sparkling. Trystane jerked upright a little more, reaching again to hold Myrcella’s hand.

“Quentyn, may I present my wife, the Princess Myrcella. Lady, my brother, Quentyn.” She allowed her eyes to lower slightly – the effect, above her gauzy veil, was disarming, she knew.

“My lord prince. Master of Laws for the Seven Kingdoms, and strong right hand for her grace, Queen Daenerys. It is my honor and pleasure to meet you, finally.” She allowed the barest hint of reproach to tinge her voice, as if to chastise him for being away for so long, and his laugh was rueful.

“Sweetly spoken, Myrcella. Yet it sounds much more impressive than it is. But I am glad to meet you, and find you well.” He took her hand, and then embraced her gently, the movement drawn out just a hint longer than it needed to be. Improper it might have been, but it actually relaxed her, a little. She knew it was for the audience, all of the pairs of eyes about the courtyard, from the servants to the sworn knights. She wore Martell colors and Dornish dress, lived, ate, and acted as a Dornishwoman in every respect, and was publicly claimed by the family. It was all to everyone’s benefit, and safety.

“Let us retire somewhere private, Quentyn,” Arianne interrupted. “I am sure everyone could use a little refreshment in the solar. Even in spring, midday is warm.” Her words were light-hearted, but something about her expression struck Myrcella as intent, like a great cat with her prey. Patience fit Arianne’s nature very ill.

“Indeed. This family chat might continue better elsewhere,” Quentyn agreed, turning and striding into the keep, across tiled floors and toward a hallway that led toward the Golden Tower, where honored guests generally stayed. Not the princess’s solar, then, but Quentyn’s, she realized.

“My sister tells me that you have enjoyed the comforts of the Water Gardens for the past several years,” Quentyn continued, his gaze taking in Trystane and Myrcella both. His walk was brisk, and Myrcella silently thanked her habit of walking the gardens extensively each day for her ability to keep up with his long strides.

“It was always Father’s favorite place,” Trys replied. “It has been a safe place for Myrcella, and a refuge when I can be with her.” Myrcella wondered at the question. Would they be put out of the gardens? Arianne had allowed them to stay there, finding little use for the retreat herself, but perhaps Daenerys would wish her to be more closely watched here at Sunspear, where she could easily station many agents of her court. Myrcella would miss her sweet oranges and cool pools, but she could stay in the city, if she must. It was far better than any alternative.

“You have had few visitors there, I presume? Well, and true, there was little thought for feasting guests or bathing in frigid pools among bare branches, I’m sure,” Quentyn said, shaking his head.  
“The gardens recover remarkably, my lord,” Myrcella replied. “I hope you will have the opportunity to see them while you are visiting.”

“Oh, I’m certain we will,” Quentyn replied as the four of them continued down a broad, well-lit hallway. They were trailed by a few servants, and others stopped and bowed as they passed. Obeisance not for her, Myrcella knew, and that was just as well. She was tired, and wished for the opportunity to rest, away from these polite but necessary exchanges. Yet she hoped still that she would find out some inkling of Quentyn’s purpose here as it related to her. The marked acceptance of her status as a member of the family was a good sign, but there was still so much unsaid.

“I long for a ride along the coast when the opportunity presents itself. The dust and deserts of the East simply don’t compare. Nothing does compare to Dorne. I have missed her.” Finally, they reached the solar, and a graceful female servant opened the door for them onto an airy room with colors evoking the sea – pale blue walls, white and soft green silk cushions and chairs, and a rug of deep, stony gray. Two walls were covered with intricate tiles, one displaying a map of Dorne, with elegant heraldry of all of the Martells’ major bannermen painted to mark their hereditary seats. On the other, Queen Nymeria put the torch to her own Rhoynish ships, her expression one of righteous certainty. A broad, low table filled the center of the room, with a light supper laid out, along with a chilled pitcher of wine. Lamb had been marinated in some thick paste of herbs and sliced thin, accompanied by crumbly white cheese, roasted peppers and chewy flatbread. Trystane led her to a couch beside the table, but she did not sit, waiting for Arianne and Quentyn to join them.

“Oh, do sit, my dear. These are not the rooms _most_ important guests receive,” Arianne commented dryly in an aside to Myrcella. “The largest rooms, with the most impressive solar, are all in gold, orange and red, bright and radiant – a very useful reminder, for certain guests, from time to time.” Myrcella smiled a little in spite of her best efforts – to surround a visitor with symbols of Martell power was hardly subtle, but potentially effective, in its way. She settled on the soft blue couch at Arianne’s word as Trystane reached for the pitcher of wine to pour for them all. Arianne stood beside a chair, watching as Quentyn ambled about the room, hands clasped behind his back, moving to the map behind Myrcella’s cushion to admire the carefully drawn work.

“And yet, you put me here, dear sister, because I do already know the colors of our house very well, and I prefer to relax on occasion,” Quentyn smiled as the servant closed the door behind them.

“I think, actually, she put you here because of the hidden door, Quentyn,” spoke a dry, familiar male voice. Myrcella froze, her mouth slightly agape below her veil, before surging to her feet and whirling to look behind her toward the source of the interjection. Quentyn had stepped away from the map, and in the lower part of it, a solid sea-blue block of tiles had pushed away from the wall, opening to reveal a short passageway into another room, this one, too, appointed in the colors of the sea and sky. It framed the small figure there startlingly, dressed as he was in black, trimmed with only the faintest touches of gold piping. There was a gauntness about him – though his head had always looked far too large for his body, it was now exaggerated, and his cheeks were sunken and his skin pale. The redness of the scar that had removed most of his nose was startling against the pallor of his skin, and his bristling, cropped beard did little to mask his grim appearance.

“Myrcella, my dear, get rid of the veil. I haven’t seen your face for so long, and you will always be prettier than me, child, never fear.” His mouth was twisted in a grim sort of smile and his brow furrowed, but his mismatched eyes softened to see her. Myrcella reached up and pulled away the veil from her face, a golden pin bouncing from her hair and falling into the plush carpet as Trys hissed a curse of surprise at the sudden appearance of her infamous kinsman.

“Uncle, I...” She trailed off, at a loss for words while questions echoed in her head, battering themselves against her clenched teeth. _Why didn’t you write? Why didn’t you send a raven or a messenger to me? Or why not an assassin, if you truly killed Joff and grandfather? Why not me?_ Some of her internal storm must have been clear in her eyes, because his brow drew down even further as did his sagging shoulders.

“No kiss, no embrace? You used to be such a sweet, trusting girl,” he said gently, no rebuke in his voice, only wistfulness. “But I understand you’re better off otherwise. Such a girl will not fare well in this world. I’m sorry, Myrcella, for this charade. I did not write because I am not here, not so far as anyone is to know beyond this room.”

“How is that even possible?” Trystane asked. “My lord, how could you have been disguised so well?”

“Hidden, boy, not disguised. Still, you seem clever enough. I am glad to find that I never gave my dear niece to a fool, since you grasped the difficulty of hiding me in plain sight very quickly. Disguise does little for me, but I’ve been hidden in a different way. I traveled a few moments here and there in a very large trunk when it was needful – luckily they didn’t have to mind my nose while bolting the lid down – but the rest of the time, I’ve walked freely. We took no servants on this trip, only a small number of the queen’s most dependable men, and a page to aid Lord Quentyn. The Unsullied are not bought, and their tongues do not waggle. Of course, neither do their cocks; they have none left. But I am, as always, uncouth. I have been hidden, and none will know that I was here when I leave the same way.”

“But why hide yourself? You serve the queen, and she has cleared you of any wrongdoing. Casterly Rock is yours, and even my maids gossip about how the queen seeks your counsel, when they think I cannot hear.” Myrcella’s voice cut more sharply than she intended, but her uncle’s dry witticisms left her confused and unsettled.

“Because we’re going to rewrite history tonight, my dear, and I don’t want to be anywhere near that. The Queen and I thought it best, as everyone will find things rather hard to accept even without my presence thrown into the situation. I’ve been the source of and inspiration for altogether too many rumors,” Tyrion explained, walking to her and reaching up to take her hand and squeeze it.

“Please forgive me. And Queen Daenerys; she has asked for your forgiveness, too.” His voice was sober, and earnest. She sunk down to her knees on the plus carpet, looking her uncle full in the eye.

“Why? Why does the queen need my forgiveness? She has shown great forbearance in not simply having me killed, or at least kept under lock and key in the Red Keep for the rest of my days…unless…” She looked soberly at Tyrion. “For Joff? And grandfather? Were you doing as she bid even then, and you’re seeking _my_ pardon?” she asked, incredulous. Tyrion looked at her, his face immobile with something that might be shock, even as she remembered that they were not alone in this room, and she was asking most unsuitable questions, even if the witnesses were now her family.

“By all the gods old and new, no, Myrcella. Not for that. The queen had no hand in either matter, and, I tell you truly, I didn’t kill Joffrey, either. Though he was a vile creature and I probably ought to have, I believe the current Lady Stark, my former wife, had that honor. My father….is not a matter we will speak of today. I have my limits, child. But, no, that is not why I’m seeking your pardon. It is for letting you believe a lie,” Tyrion said simply, looking back over his shoulder at the portal to the adjoining room.  
“You might as well join us, now. Best to explain after,” he said, pitching his voice somewhat loudly, enough to carry through the passage into the room.

At first, the figure who stepped through the door was a stranger to her. A young man, perhaps her own age, dressed simply in an orange page’s doublet worked with the sun and spear on the breast. _Quentyn’s page? But who…_ His hair was chestnut brown and thick, and he was not quite yet grown into manhood, though it would not be long. He was tall, though there was a hint of softness about his face and form that spoke of recent growth spurts. Myrcella’s mind raced until she met his eyes, a soft, deep sea green, and then she gasped, her shaking hand lifting to cover her mouth.

“Tommen…” she whispered. “How is this possible?” Her first step was hesitant, but the rest she made nearly running, as she went to him and embraced him tightly, nearly pushing him back into the little passageway with the force of her rush. His arms came around her as well, but she pushed him to arm’s length, her eyes drinking in his face. “How?” she demanded again, looking from his sheepish expression back to her uncle, who looked about to speak.

“It was the queen’s idea,” Tommen said. Myrcella’s breath caught at his voice. So familiar, and so different now. “You’ll like her, Myrcella. She’s very clever, and very beautiful. But, after Mother was arrested, they hid me away from just about everyone. I hardly left my rooms, because Uncle Kevan was so afraid that someone would kill me, or steal me away, and so people began to talk about how I wasn’t even really in King’s Landing, even before the queen marched south with her dragons and took the city. By then, everyone assumed I had to have been killed somewhere, somehow. Most of the Kingsguard was dead, or gone – either fled home or gone north to fight – so everyone assumed they no longer had a charge. I just…stayed. When everyone else left. I wasn’t any good to anyone as a page then, let alone a squire, so they cut my hair and put color in it, and I stayed with the family of a maid who worked in the Red Keep, Lidya.”

“They?” she asked, dazedly, not understanding.

“Oh, the serving folk. All the old nobles ran back to their holdings. The ones who could fight went north, or hid. The men Uncle Kevan left to guard me all bolted back west, probably to their families, I should think. I don’t blame them, not really. But the servants and such, they couldn’t really leave. I mean, some left the castle and never did come back, but others stayed. And Lidya and her husband Raffer, who worked in the stables, they took me home when the queen was a few days away. Their daughter Ellin did for my hair and found me some clothes. They said…they said it wasn’t right, what had happened to Rhaegar’s children, and that they didn’t want me to die by some angry lordling.” As he spoke, his eyes softened and his gaze became distant, as if all he saw was that day.

“And so Raffer said to everyone that I was his cousin’s son, and they had taken me in, and they made me understand that I couldn’t tell anyone about who I really was, or I might die. They were good to me, and so I never did.” Myrcella blinked as much to clear her eyes of tears as with disbelief at the tale, still holding onto the fabric of Tommen’s doublet, half requiring his support to stand.

“Until I recognized you cleaning my horse’s hooves a few months ago,” Tyrion drawled, shaking his head. Tommen nodded and blushed a little.

“Until Tyrion saw me helping Fa…in the stables, and brought me to the queen, yes,” he agreed.

“We had a little problem on our hands at that point. Daenerys’s desire for vengeance against those who wronged her kin has been largely slaked. She had no desire to execute or banish Tommen. But he had been hiding in plain sight, assumed dead for years. Suddenly revealing him as having always been in King’s Landing would have caused consternation among her people…and assumptions that I was behind it. They don’t trust me much for some reason,” Tyrion said.

“So we hatched a plan.” Quentyn took up the tale now, nonchalantly pouring himself a goblet of wine. “When the good lords of the Seven Kingdoms ask the queen where her predecessor on the throne has been for the past several years, she will say, ‘Oh, he has been in the care of my trusted allies in Dorne, with his sister. Now that my peace rules, I declare them free of any wrongdoing, as they were only children used for the ends of dishonorable men, and declare that any man who turns against Tommen Baratheon or Myrcella Martell, he turns against me as well.’ She will enjoy that. She has the dragon’s love of making threats that she will keep, our queen, and she is tired of intrigues against her, or killing to win her favor. But she wants to make clear to those who would still oppose her – and they exist, they always exist – that she knew where Tommen was all along, and he is fully under her control.” Quentyn sipped his wine and half-smiled.

“I am very grateful for the queen’s graciousness. I’m not entirely stupid. I know she could have had me killed very quietly and fed me to her black dragon, and it would have been of no concern to her, but she didn’t,” Tommen said with a wan smile.

“You’re not stupid. And you would give Drogon terrible indigestion,” Tyrion quipped, before looking back to Myrcella.

“So will you have your brother as your guest for a time, and pretend it has been much longer? Once the announcement has been made, and some time has passed, I can even come and visit you properly. I’ve read a great deal about these amazing Water Gardens, and I can’t wait to see them with my own eyes,” Tyrion said. Myrcella looked to Trystane, who was absorbing this bemusement.

“I think that can be arranged, with the princess’s leave, of course,” Myrcella stammered.

“Oh, for certain.” Arianne had settled in one of the cushioned chairs while the story had been told, a smile curling her lips, making her look like a satisfied housecat. “My lords will all wonder exactly how I’ve been hiding him, and why I did. It will keep them on their toes, and a visit from the Queen’s Imp on top of it will make them topple with the slightest breath of wind. This will be a joy.”

“Yes, a joy, that’s exactly how I characterize it,” Tyrion said, rubbing his short beard. “So much joy that I need some wine to celebrate. Or drown in, one or the other.”

“Then sit, unless you have another surprise to pull through the door,” Quentyn retorted, draining his goblet of wine before pouring more into each of the goblets. “The details of producing Tommen like magic can wait a bit. Let us wet our throats and rest our feet. Plotting is thirsty work.” Myrcella longed to sit and be calm, but she was in turmoil. Her eyes sought Arianne’s.

“Your people will wonder why you tolerate us,” she began. “I was bad enough, but your father made the marriage contract. Tommen…they will not understand. In the city, even today, the smallfolk cursed me. Why would you agree to this, after all that has passed between our houses?” It was a question that had burned in her since the night Arianne had failed to name her Queen and start a war with her family. If she was not a tool for their purposes, what was she but a potential weakness?

“Several reasons, Myrcella. I do what my queen asks, to be certain. To have her trust in such a matter puts our house in a position to benefit. But our family has had our justice, too. Vengeance…might suggest that I would take pleasure in your death, but I have no desire for it. Besides, my little brother is passing fond of you, and I have seen you grow into a woman as an older sister watches a younger,” Arianne said lightly.

“Also, because I can,” she added, sipping the wine that Quentyn offered her.

“Myrcella, it will be well,” Tommen said, taking her hand and leading her back to the couch, where they sat.  
“Indeed it will. Drink,” Tyrion ordered, drawing deep from his goblet. Myrcella raised hers, then held it aloft.

“To Queen Daenerys, House Martell, and the bonds of family,” she said softly, smiling at Tommen and squeezing his hand, before sharing a soft, secret look with Trystane as the other winecups were lifted high.


End file.
